THE NEXT CAREER PHASE

My contract was extended from ending 31 December last year to end 31 March.  I have been feeling for some weeks that the current project I am working on is at the stage where my work is almost complete.  Also, there is much talk about restructuring and the 'feel' of the organisation is such that I thought it unlikely my contract would be rolled a further 3 months.  Well, it was confirmed yesterday that my contract will not be extended after 31 March.  I came here originally in October 2008 on a three month contract, so to last three and a half years is pretty good but the run has come to an end.

My wife has resigned her job as she could no longer work with her immediate colleague.  My disabled son is at a critical stage where he needs to go out into the world but this will take some time (and money) to put in place and I may not have time.  No income will necessitate selling the house (+$1m) and moving out of Auckland into a cheaper 2 bedroom house and semi-retire on as much of the house equity we can realise. Our son cannot join us as the services he needs are only available in large cities such as Auckland and not in small town New Zealand.   But that will take time.  The extra mortgage we ended up with as a result of the incompetent builder and council and our leaky house will also cost us dearly, as the settlement of the legal claim only met about two thirds of our costs.

I am of an age where people will not hire me and this  is why I have stayed here so long.  I have constantly searched for permanent work and other contracts but to no avail.  My network is  now very small.  Many of my bosses and former colleagues are now dead, retired or overseas.  I am quite worried what I am going to do.  In the past I have faced redundancies and contracts ending but as a qualified professional with a lot of experience, I was never unemployed for long.  However, now I am at an age where there is no work.  I can beat the 'thumb suckers' around me at Excel, Powerpoint, Word and they often come to me to provide solutions to problems using these applications.  I read widely, all the financial and business journals and papers, to keep up to date with the latest business trends, theories and practices.  I am not sure what else I can do.